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MANHATTAN - When a rule gets massaged long enough it almost becomes too loose.

The opportunity to transfer between Division I-A football programs as a graduate student and receive a sixth year of eligibility received some initial criticism.

Bill Snyder understood the backlash.

"You have to be careful that they're not creating ways for guys to play forever. There is a fine line," said the Kansas State coach. "But I'm certainly all in favor of young guys that lose the opportunity, because of injuries, to compete to have the opportunity to come back."

Enter Grant Gregory. The sixth-year quarterback is making K-State his third Division I-A home after starting at Indiana and then transferring to South Florida. And yes, if eligibility could be stretched even longer, he'd be all for it.

"I'd play college football until I'm 40 if they'd let you," Gregory said. "I don't think they'd grant me any more years, but I'd play anywhere."

It so happens he'll try to play for the Wildcats. Gregory competed for the South Florida job, but two weeks before the 2006 opener he injured his thumb. That allowed Matt Grothe to gain the job and he's engineered the Bulls ever since. Does so for Jim Leavitt, the former K-State assistant who built the South Florida program from scratch.

On occasion, Leavitt and Snyder chat.

"I was asking him about his program and then he said, 'What are your needs?' And I said, 'You name it."' Snyder reaclled. "I had said we're trying to create the kind of environment that is very competitive by position."

That's when Leavitt immediately suggested Gregory. With an undergraduate degree already secured, Gregory qualified as a sixth-year transfer into a I-A program. Rather than back up Grothe for a fourth season, it made sense for Gregory to explore another opportunity, even though a medical hardship allowed him to stay and compete another year at South Florida.

"Would you be interested?" Leavitt asked Snyder.

"Sure, we'd be interested," Snyder replied.

One conversation remained.

"When coach Leavitt told me about this opportunity and the scholarship got offered here, it was too good to pass up," Gregory said. " I haven't accomplished anything that I set out to do, and I know I'm capable of doing it."

The pursuit of a different opportunity was something Gregory already initiated, but at the Division I-AA level. He painstakingly researched those teams and discovered 23 were losing senior quarterbacks last season. He even settled on one.

"I was ecstatic to go to Eastern Kentucky," he said. "It's unbelievable to think I've got an opportunity to still play Big 12 football. It's been a crazy, weird, exciting journey and I'm just glad to be here."

Gregory, who is listed at 6-foot-1, 210 pounds and is from Athens, Ohio, took his first repetitions for the Wildcats last week when fall practice began. He immediately noticed the structural similarities Snyder passed on to Leavitt.

Junior Carson Coffman entered camp as a returnee who backed up Josh Freeman the past two seasons, then got a jump on the competition in spring drills. Gregory did, however, take snaps in the same number of games (six) last season.

Snyder hopes to name a starter at least a week prior to the Sept. 5 opener against Massachusetts.

Ask Gregory to list his attributes and it's easy to detect a QB who marketed himself as a transfer.

"I have a great attitude. I'm a winner. I have great versatility. I've been around. I know what makes teams good; I know what makes them bad," Gregory said, adding that he offers balance as a runner and passer. "If I develop in this offense, I'll be smarter with it and the better you are mentally with an offense, the less turnovers you're going to have."

Then he revealed the hardened edge honed as the consummate teammate playing behind Grothe at South Florida.

"You're going to see someone with passion for the game," Gregory said. "If you cut my arm off and told me we were going to win the Big 12 this year, that would be fine. I wouldn't care at all."